Relations: An Anthology of African and Diaspora Voices


 
 
 
 
 
 
 Contents
 
 Cover
 Title Page
 Contents
 Introduction
 Nanyuman by Ayesha Harruna Attah
 so long and Fuji-san by Mogolodi Bond
 The Body Is More than a Landfill and Less than All That I Am by Sarah Uheida
 To the woman who accused me of breastfeeding the madam’s child and By Any Other Name by Phillippa Yaa de Villiers
 Ezouga and Post Mortem by Bahia Mahmud H. Awah
 Daughter of a Bedouin Chief by Miral al-Tahawy
 God’s Plan by Boakyewaa Glover
 Her Sweetie, Her Sugarcane by Natasha Omokhodion-Kalulu Banda
 Krifé by Chiké Frankie Edozien
 Queens and Sleeping Beauty (of Borehamwood) and Waterstones and Ode to a Discarded Face Mask and Denouement by Dami Ajayi
 Finding Descartes by Reem Gaafar
 Fulbright by Rémy Ngamije
 Dirty Money by Kim Coleman Foote
 The Killmonger Doctrine of Color and Humanity by Joe Robert Cole
 Churai by Fatima Camara
 [Coolitude: ce balisier-mirador] by Khal Torabully
 This Tangible Thing by Yejide Kilanko
 In a Yellow Dress with Red Flowers by Lillian Akampurira Aujo
 A Honey-Headed Child by Nana Nyarko Boateng
 Napoleão by Conceição Lima
 Atat by Arao Ameny
 Sontem and Në na’a mpúrí haalo and En la puerta primavera by Recaredo Silebo Boturu
 Lagos Wives Club by Vanessa Walters
 I Am Lost! by Richard Ali A Mutu K
 Poor Men Have Too Much Ego by Edwige-Renée Dro
 Sundays in Nairobi by Jacquelynn Kerubo
 Mbuya Baines by Makanaka Mavengere
 The Swagger Stick Man of June Fifteen by Chuma Nwokolo
 The Heart 
 
 Introduction
 
 Years ago, I was at a party in New York. I was single, and I presume the man I stood on an invisible island with was unattached,
 too. Separate from the clusters of aspiring photographers and models, and friends like me who had tagged along to this photographer’s
 studio, the two of us huddled together, gripping cups of clever bravado, our heads tilted toward one another at an angle of
 intrigue and lust. He was witty and worldly, and as we spoke, we discovered we were both from other places: he had moved to
 the United States from Morocco, and I was the daughter of Ghanaian immigrants who had sent me to live and school in Ghana
 when I was twelve years old.
 
 
 “Oh, how cool,” he said, “I’ve never been to Africa.”
 
 I blinked at my cup and then at him, sure I hadn’t heard right. “But, aren’t you Moroccan?”
 
 “Yes,” he said, the blank stare in his eyes not following my point.
 
 “But, Morocco is in Africa.”
 
 He appeared genuinely unconvinced.
 
 There was a whiteboard in the middle of the studio. I left our island to draw a map of Africa on it, and traced out two jagged
 rectangles.
 
 
 “Morocco,” I said, pointing to the rectangle in the top left corner. “Ghana,” I said of the other one. “Africa,” I concluded.
 
 After a slight pause, he nodded